One of my best friends doesn’t have much interest in history. In our twenty years of friendship, we’ve good-naturedly teased each other about being the history nerd and the science geek. But she has also made me ask the question: why does history matter? And in the context of Women’s History Month in particular, why does women’s history matter?
We all know the cliché that those who don’t know history are doomed to repeat it. But as we see women making enormous strides in the last century, the cliché may not seem very true: why focus on the oppression of the past, on women whose lives were constrained by patriarchal beliefs, when we have so many inspiring examples of women winning the right to vote, shattering glass ceilings, running Fortune 500...Read more
It wasn’t until 2017 that TIME Magazine honored women silence breakers as their “Person of the Year.” Truth be told, women have been breaking the silence on abuse and harassment for centuries. They have often been God’s hands of compassion and liberation, working to expose evil and topple systems of oppression. Reflecting on women’s history of silence breaking is a spiritual discipline that nurtures our souls and forges bold leadership across time and culture. And who better to contemplate than Esther, whose silence breaking opposed the powerful and prevented a genocide by standing with God and the vulnerable! Then and now, holy leadership is often the best resolution to wicked and unjust rulers and regimes. With every retelling of her story, a godly force is...Read more
Yesterday, Desiring God published an article (by staff writer, Greg Morse) lamenting the hit Captain Marvel movie, and specifically its “feminist agenda.” According to Morse, feminist ideology “contrasts so unapologetically with reality” that it can only be sustained in an alternate universe. Morse writes:
“Verse after verse, story after story, fact after fact, study after study, example after example dispels the myth of sameness between the sexes. The alternative universe where an accident infuses the heroine with superhuman powers, however, seems to stand as a reasonable apologetic for the feminist agenda.”
This is a classic strawman argument: studies say that men and women are not exactly the same. Therefore, the feminist agenda is mythology o...Read more
Editor’s Note: This article is part of a series on difficult Bible passages entitled “What to Say When…”
“The Bible says wives should submit to husbands, because men are the head of women.”
Sigh. Some of us have heard this overly simplistic and frankly convenient interpretation of Paul’s words in Ephesians 5:18-32. But are we taking the “household codes” seriously enough in their own context? Is there more to this passage than meets the eye?
The Household Code and the Paterfamilias
Ephesians 5:22-6:9 is often referred to simply as the “household code.” The household code was a literary form for rules about behavior in the household. They used very wealthy families as an idealized model. Everyone in these households...Read more
Editor’s Note: This article is part of a series on difficult Bible passages entitled “What to Say When…”
1 Timothy 2 is a tricky passage to interpret well. Verses 11-15 alone contain four biblical “buzz phrases” often employed by those who oppose women’s equality in the church. Paul writes:[1]
1. Women should learn in silence (2:11).
2. I do not permit a woman to teach or dominate a man (2:12).
3. The woman was deceived and became a sinner (2:14).
4. Women will be saved through childbearing (2:15).
These troubling verses form, for many, the foundation of the case for women’s submission to men and against the legitimacy of women’s preaching and teaching in church and/or to men. Though it would appear those opposed to women...Read more
Editor's Note: This is one of our Top 20 winners from the 2018 CBE Writing Contest. Enjoy!
“Your pastor is a woman?!”
I was seventeen years old when I first heard this surprised remark. The askers looked at me with such disbelief when I told them “yes, my pastor is a woman.” I looked at them with similar wonder, dying to ask in return:
“You go to a Christian church, right?”
I grew up in a Spanish-speaking Assemblies of God church. It was normal to hear a woman preach there on any given Sunday. We called them pastoras—pastors. We didn‘t give them any other title because pastoras is what they were. Much to my surprise, few English-speaking churches I’ve encountered allow women to preach, much less give them an official title....Read more
You’re at a holiday event and you mention that you’ve been asked to guest preach at your church. Your grandpa or your aunt or cousin brings up 1 Corinthians 14. In your college theology class, you mention that your pastor is a woman and a male student cites this troubling verse. You mentioned your egalitarian beliefs at Tuesday night Bible study and several of the members invite you to explain or defend your position. What do you say? How do you explain your egalitarian interpretation of this complex passage?
Here’s a few ideas:
The book of 1 Corinthians is all about how to be in a mature community of people who have the Spirit of God. Paul begins with a famous verse: “God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise” (1 Cor. 1:27). People do not...Read more
By now, you’ve probably seen Gillette’s “We Believe: The Best Men Can Be” ad. Launched last week online, the ad depicts several examples of toxic masculinity, including bullying, harassment, mansplaining, and the notion that “boys will be boys.” For those that may not know, toxic masculinity refers to masculinity that encourages aggressive and violent behavior and discourages emotion and self-control. In other words, masculinity that is both dangerous for women and harmful to men. It's also crucial to note that toxic masculinity does not mean that all masculinity is toxic. The ad ends by exhorting men to embrace a healthy vision for masculinity, with text that reads: “it’s only by challenging ourselves to do more that we can get clos...Read more
Trigger warning: this article contains numerous graphic accounts of sexual violence.
“What’s wrong with me?”
I’ve asked myself this question each time I’ve been assaulted by a Christian man I trusted. Each time it happened, I felt guilty, alone, and sure it was my fault.
For decades, I hid these painful secrets from everyone. I was a Christian. An excellent student in my native Finland, then in Japan, and then in the US. An accomplished pianist. A missionary. A minister’s wife. A professor. A pilot. A social reformer. I had a PhD. I was well-known in my circles.
Nobody knew. Nobody guessed my secret shame.
But, I knew it was my fault. It had to be. Otherwise, why would I be the repeated target of sexual offense by Christian ministers and lea...Read more
Editor's Note: This is one of our Top 20 winners from the 2018 CBE Writing Contest. Enjoy!
I was seven years old—sitting in a hard, metal desk, staring at the hole-y paddle hanging ominously on the wall, and wearing a skirt that reached three inches from my knee—when my teacher told us God didn’t want women to be pastors.
Shocked, I thought, “How can this be? Why does God like boys more than girls?”
I went home that day and cried to my mom that I wanted to be a boy.
I was in fifth grade, standing with my parents in the church parking lot and staring at the black asphalt beneath my feet as I listened to a grown woman weep. Her ministry had been shut down by church leadership, she told my parents. The elders had determined that even though her minis...Read more
